Coordinated call with India on waste to renewable hydrogen

The main goal of this opportunity is to create new technologies for producing renewable hydrogen from biogenic wastes that cannot be recycled. The focus is on using agricultural, forest, and municipal biogenic waste, sewage sludge, and industrial wastewaters. Projects should aim to improve resource efficiency, reduce greenhouse gas emissions or achieve a negative carbon footprint, lower environmental pollution and water use, and significantly cut hydrogen production costs. Key areas include biochemical and thermochemical pathways, advanced catalysts, process intensification, feedstock pretreatment, and side stream utilization. The geographic scope covers collaborations between the European Union and India, targeting sustainability and safety in renewable hydrogen production.

• Proposals must follow required formatting and page limits.
• Each project must include at least one work package coordinated with a linked project funded by India's Ministry of New and Renewable Energy (MNRE).
• Indian organizations can participate only as associated partners.
• EU and Indian projects must start at the same time, have the same duration and targets, and show strong coordination.
• Projects should focus on innovative renewable hydrogen production from biogenic wastes, resource efficiency, and cost reduction.
• Efforts and budgets should be balanced between EU and India, with clear plans for joint networking and activities.

Examples:

• A project developing a new catalyst to increase hydrogen yield from municipal sewage sludge, with parallel research teams in the EU and India.
• A joint EU-India initiative testing process intensification methods for converting agricultural waste into hydrogen, ensuring synchronized milestones.
• A coordinated effort to design a sustainable pretreatment process for forest residues, with matched budgets and shared results between both regions.

• Personnel costs (researchers, engineers, technical staff)
• Equipment and laboratory materials directly related to project activities
• Consumables used in research and development
• Travel and accommodation for project meetings, networking, and joint activities
• Costs for joint workshops, conferences, and dissemination events
• Subcontracting necessary for specific project tasks
• Costs for data collection, analysis, and reporting
• Expenses for safety and environmental assessments
• Communication and dissemination materials
• Project management and coordination costs

Restrictions: Expenses must be directly related to the project's research and innovation activities and should contribute to balanced cooperation between EU and Indian partners.

• Budget for this Call: 10.000.000€
• Number of Grants attributed: 2
• Budget per project: 5.000.000€

• Participants must form a consortium comprising at least three independent legal entities from three different eligible countries (EU Member States or Horizon Europe associated countries), with at least one partner from an EU country.
• Entities based in India may participate as associated partners, but are not mandatory under Horizon rules.
• All consortium partners must demonstrate adequate financial and operational capacity as per Annex B and C requirements.
• Projects must be closely coordinated with the Indian counterpart funded under the parallel India Call via MNRE: proposals are expected to allocate sufficient budget to support joint activities and networking, including regular joint meetings.
• The project scope must focus on converting waste into renewable hydrogen, aligning with EU‑India strategic partnership objectives and ensuring balanced efforts and budgets between EU and Indian sides .
• Standard Horizon Europe checks apply, including ethics, integrity, exclusion, conflict-of-interest, and legal/operational compliance.
• Funding follows the RIA model, with 100% funding rate and lump-sum budgets—typically around €5 million per project, within a total €10 million call budget.